The Hawk's Eyes
by writergirl3005
Summary: Riza has had enough of being bullied for her red eyes. The solution? Ask her father to change their colour with alchemy.


I wrote this based of a head canon by chuuii

Original headcanon:I kind of wrote a fic about this before but it was a long time ago and it was kind of awful, and I have modified this headcanon. I've always believed Riza to be part Ishvalan, somewhere on her mother's side, and her mom had the trademark red Ishvalan eyes and those were passed on to Riza as well.

After the conflict with Ishval started Riza started to get bullied at school for obviously having the heritage (this might not even be possible timeline wise? can't exactly recall when the ishval thing started in correlation with riza's age but im going with it.) on top of how much she is already bullied for being the daughter of the town's freaky witch guy (also mini headcanon they Riza grew up in such a small town they they literally thought alchemy was witchcraft because it was so foreign to them) so she tells her dad about it and he just gets that scary look in his eyes and smiles.

He draws a transmutation and literally tries to change the colour of her eyes (kind of like how Ed can change his hair colour with alchemy in 03? i guess.) but he immediately thinks it backfires because she just starts screaming and there blood leaking out of her eyes so he wraps her up in bandages and takes her to the doctors.

When he gets there the doctor is kind of furious at him for doing that to her (mini headcanon again to everyone who has read we that are young, since then I've always considered the town doctor a great friend and second mom to riza) but by then the pain has subsided and the bleeding stopped and she takes off the bandages to see that the transmutation was successful and her eye colour changed into the sort of dark brown colour she had in the 2009 anime.

Then she checks her version because she's almost certain there must be some kind of damage but in reality her version has actually gotten better, so much better in fact that it isn't really possible for a human to have such great vision you could say she had… the eyes of a hawk.

* * *

Riza was trying to get home as fast as she could. She didn't want to meet any of her classmates along the way. Just a few more minutes, and she'll get to where Roy would be waiting. It would be much harder to attack two people instead of just one.

She fingered the slingshot she always carried with her. There were still some stones she carried in a small bag, but she wanted to use those for emergencies. And, she reminded herself, dealing with jerks and idiots doesn't count as emergencies. Unfortunately.

She was glad when she spotted Roy,leaning against a fence post. "Hi Riza!" he called out cheerfully, waving his hand in greeting. She couldn't help but smile at that. Roy was such a dork.

He ran over to her and hugged her tightly. "How was school?" he asked. He held her hand as the walked back to the house. Riza didn't want to admit how much she liked the feeling of Roy's hand in hers.

She grimaced. "I don't want to talk about it."

"Oh." He didn't say anything else, as if he sensed that she didn't want to talk. They walked in silence for a few minutes. Riza knew that Roy won't be silent for long. Sure enough, he questioned her about it.

"Riza," asked Roy, placing a hand on her shoulder. "Did something happen in school? Did anybody bother you today?"

"No." But the look on Roy's face made her sigh and correct herself. "Yes, they did."

"Did they give you grief about you father and best friend being alchemists again?"

She shook her head. "Not today." Which was unusual. The village she lived in was so tiny that barely made it on a map; and most of the people regarded alchemy either with suspicion or frightened awe.

"If not that, then why? Did the girls say you're not pretty enough? Not girly enough? 'Cause that's just nonsense, you're very beautiful Riza."

Riza blushed at his compliments. She could tell that Roy really meant them. "It's not that either." But before he could ask any more questions, she just decided to tell him. He would find a way to drag it out of her anyway. "They teased me about my eyes."

Roy looked at her in confusion. "What's wrong with your eyes? They're beautiful. Why, would anybody bother you about your beautiful eyes?"

Riza sighed. Roy had a massive crush on her ( to be honest, she was crushing on him as well) and he was looking at her through rose-coloured glasses. Of course he would say that. What else did she expect?

"They're red."

"Oh," said Roy, looking down at the ground. "The riots in Ishval. Did they give you grief because of that?"

Riza nodded. "Yes they did."

Roy took her hands in his. "Don't listen to a word they say Riza. With people like this, sometimes it's best to just ignore them."

She nodded, but she wasn't convinced. There had to be something that she could do to change how she looked.

She didn't want to put up with the teasing and taunting any more.

Her father had sent Roy to do some research in the library. They were alone now. This was as good a time as any to ask.

"Father, can I ask you something?"

Berthold Hawkeye looked at his daughter curiously. "What is it Little Bird?"

"Can you change the colour of my eyes? The students at school are giving me a hard time, and I've tried to ignore them, but I just can't tolerate in anymore. Please Father, can you do anything? Can alchemy do anything?" she was begging by now, but she no longer cared.

Berthold studied his daughter for a few minutes. Riza could almost hear the gears whirling in his head. "I'm sure that there is something we can do. I'll have to research it. I'll get the Mustang boy-"

"Please," she cut in. "Don't tell Mr Mustang. I want you to do it."

"He'll know what you did Little Bird. It's not something that you can hide."

"Not until after it's done. Please, just don't tell him."

The silence that followed was oppressive. Riza was tense. What if he refused her? There was a chance that he would-

"Fine."

"What?" she asked, her head snapping up to look at her father.

"I said fine. I'll see what I can do, and I won't tell the boy. But I need to know that you are absolutely sure about this Riza."

"I'm sure," she said. She was proud of the fact that there was no waver in her voice.

* * *

 _A few days later_

Riza watched as her father drew the array on the floor. She hoped that this would be over soon. Roy was absorbed in his studies, but that could change anytime soon. His attention span can be erratic. Sometimes he could be absorbed in a text for hours at time and at others had a worse attention span than a five year old.

"It's done," said Berthold as he drew the final line. "Lie on top of it Little Bird, it'll be over soon."

Riza did as he instructed. She tried to calm the rapid beating of her heart. Soon. It'll be over soon. Everything will be alright.

There was a flash of blue alchemical light as Berthold activated the circle. And then Riza screamed.

Berthold was panicking. His daughter was in pain, but he had to complete the transmutation. He just hoped-

Roy burst into the room. "Teacher! What are you doing! Stop the transmutation! She's in pain!"

"I can't!" he shouted back. "I have to complete it! Things will be worse for her if the transmutation is stopped midway."

The minute the transmutation ended, Roy leapt to Riza's side; she had passed out. He shook her to try and wake her. "Riza, Riza, please wake up." It was then he noticed the blood around her eyes. "Teacher! We need to get her a doctor right away! She's hurt!"

* * *

Sophia Manning stormed into the house, her steps creating a staccato rhythm. "Berthold Hawkeye what have you done this time? I swear if either of the children is hurt because of one of your experiments I'll-" She stopped on seeing the look on Berthold's face. "It's bad isn't it?"

"She asked me to use alchemy to change the colour of her eyes," he said tiredly.

"And you agreed to it?" Sophia asked incredulously. "My God Berthold, have you no sense whatsoever? The eyes are among the most delicate parts of the body; they could be easily damaged and-"

"Don't lecture me right now," he snapped. "Just go to her and make sure she'll alright."

Sophia run up the stairs to Riza's bedroom. Riza was lying on the bed with a bandage warped around her eyes. Roy sat siting next to the bed. His left hand was clasping Riza's, his thumb gently stroking her hand every few minutes.

"Roy," she called out. Roy turned to look at her with red eyes and tear stained cheeks.

"Will she be alright Miss Sophia? She won't be hurt permanently because of this?"

Sophia said nothing. She carefully unwrapped the bandages. She gently pried open Risa's eyes and examined them. So the transmutation had worked. Riza's eyes were now a deep brown instead of the ruby red they used to be. There didn't seem to be anything wrong, but she needed to perform more tests to make sure.

"I'm not sure Roy," she said. Sophia didn't want to give the boy any false reassurances. "I need to take her to my clinic so that I can take a closer look at her. Why Berthold didn't bring her straight away to the clinic is beyond me."

"He thought that she shouldn't be moved."

Sophia snorted. While Berthold may be an alchemical genius, he had no clue about medicine.

"Well, don't just sit there, come and help me."

"Yes ma'am," said Roy and went to help her.

* * *

 _The next day_

Sophia Manning couldn't believe it. The only thing that had changed in Riza was the colour of her eyes. There was no apparent damage. Could she have been lucky enough to escape such a transmutation unscathed?

"Is there anything wrong with my eyes Miss Sophia?" Riza asked. She had regained consciousness a few hours ago, and she seemed perfectly alright.

"Nothing that I could see. But I want to test you sight just in case there is any loss of vision."

Riza cocked her head to the side, her brows lifting in confusion. "But I can see just fine, Miss Sophia," she protested. "If you can't see anything wrong, and if I can see oust fine, then there's nothing to worry about right?"

Sophia smiled. "But I still want to check, just in case. You may think you're fine, but there can be some problems that won't be immediately apparent. I just want to make absolute certain. Okay Riza?"

Riza sighed. "Alright Miss Sophia."

Sophia thought that she had all her surprises for the year when she realised that Riza suffered no ill effects from the transmutation.

Boy, was she ever wrong. "Berthold, I need to speak with you," she called out to him.

Berthold slowly rose from the chair and followed her into her office. The man looked as if he had aged ten years in the past day. Despite all evidence to the contrary, he did love his child. He slumped into one of the visitors' chair and looked up at her pleadingly. "What is wrong with her Sophia? Is there anything that can be done to fix it?"

She took a deep breath and released it, trying to calm herself. "There is nothing wrong with Riza, per say."

He turned to her sharply. "Sophia Manning, my daughter may be permanently injured. Just get to the point instead of speaking in riddles!"

"There is nothing wrong with her vision. It's perfect." She avoided looking at him.

Berthold stood up and slammed his palms on her desk. "Then why did you call me here?"

"You misunderstand me. Her vision is perfect. Much too good for a human." She looked at him in the eye. "In fact, you could say that she now has the eyes of a hawk."


End file.
